


Soft Landing

by bioticbootyshaker



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-05
Updated: 2012-12-05
Packaged: 2017-11-20 09:41:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/583948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bioticbootyshaker/pseuds/bioticbootyshaker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For every soldier beaten down by war, there is a soft place to land.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Soft Landing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [foxghost](https://archiveofourown.org/users/foxghost/gifts).



Purgatory was alive with a beat, not all that dissimilar to Cortez's own heartbeat when Shepard was close to him. Fast, hard, unsteady, with no clear rhythm but plenty of power. When Shepard pulled him close, their hips aligned and his fingers tangled in the fabric of Cortez' shirt -- right over the small of his back, which had always been a sensitive place -- Cortez wasn't sure if there was any music playing at all. Shepard had an easy pair of eyes to get lost in, and Cortez had long since stopped fighting their inexorable pull. 

Are you a biotic? Cortez wanted to ask, but the joke was tired and Shepard had probably heard it a thousand times. He settled for resting his face against Shepard's throat and letting his arms wrap around his waist. 

"There's a hotel around here," Shepard said. Cortez could feel his voice against his face, a deep rumble under his throat. He closed his eyes, tightened his arms around Shepard's middle. He let Shepard be his pilot for a while, guiding him where he wanted, steering him with little turbulence, trusting him to give him a soft landing. "Used to be anyway," Shepard continued, "We could... find a room, if you want. Only if you want, though, I'm not trying to---" Shepard sighed, and it got tangled with a chuckle. "Shit, Steve, I'm trying to be smooth here."

"You are," Cortez murmured. 

Shepard had never been smooth. Figuratively or literally, he was hard edges and a rough surface. Graceless and awkward in conversation, skin a mapwork of scars and calluses and old burns. For Cortez, though, it was all a matter of opinion. One man's soft landing was another man's smoking wreckage -- you just had to shift your perception a little. 

****

The room was small, but it wasn't like they needed a lot of room. In fact, the less space the better; all the more reason for them to press tight together.

Cortez liked to kiss his scars, liked to let Shepard know that pain didn't have to last forever, the way Shepard had let _him_ know. More than anything he liked feeling that skin warm under his mouth and hands, liked feeling Shepard's pulse on his lips and between his teeth. Cortez slid a little lower and felt that pulse at the back of his throat, Shepard's nails on his scalp and his thighs trembling and his voice husky and breathless. "Watch the teeth," Shepard whispered, and Cortez stopped to laugh.

In the dark it was a little easier to be honest, to be vulnerable, to let himself be exposed where Shepard could touch him but not see him. "I need you to be safe," Cortez whispered. It was easier, still, when they were curled together, sweaty and tired and close enough to melt together. Easier when Shepard's arm was around his shoulder and Shepard's lips were pressed to his forehead.

"No promises," Shepard said, "But I'm trying, Steve."

That was all either of them -- _any_ of them -- could do. Try to be safe, to see tomorrow, to win, to carry on. Try to make the moments they had a little sweeter and a little easier to bear.

Try to give each other a soft landing.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for foxghost on tumblr, to offer a little bit of cheer. :)


End file.
